Some people eat it with bread, rice, and others even with gula. In any case, encebollado is one of the typical dishes of Ecuador, consumed daily or weekly.

So does Evelyn, who longs to come every weekend to buy onions sold in his neighborhood for $2.50 a bulb. “Onions are like bread with coffee (laughs). It is something we will never be able to stop eating,” says the citizen.

And that is that this product, which contains cassava, onions, fish and other things, is not only consumed through small neighborhood businesses and restaurants, You can also buy it canned or frozen in supermarkets to taste later.

La Casa del Encebollado has been serving frozen encebollado since 2022, says owner William Parra. “We thought about this idea for a long time because there are many customers who wanted to take onions abroad for their relatives, for example to Spain, the United States and elsewhere. So I said, ‘Let’s make one and find a way for people to wear it.’ A simple option”, notes Parra, who undertook the process of obtaining a sanitary register, a nutritional table, and thus the frozen onion was born.

Frozen encebollado will arrive at Guayaquil airport duty free

This sale started in twelve stores owned by Casa del Encebollado, in Guayaquil, Cuenca and Samborondón. Later, Parra’s idea was to get into supermarkets and at the end of 2022, he managed to get into Megamaxi and Supermaxi Favorite Corporation.

“We applied and they immediately gave us distribution coverage,” Parra says, adding that he ships frozen product to the company every week and it expands across the country. In the beginning there were five boxes a month, whose content is ten units each, and now there are between 30 and 40, which is the equivalent of up to 400 onions. Demand in Parra’s own stores reaches about 200 frozen products per month.

The owner of Casa del Encebollado advises to take the product wrapped in newspaper or in the refrigerator on short trips of five to six hours. If it is a longer trip, such as Spain, China, it can be handled with a cooling battery. “It lasts (frozen) for up to 24 hours,” he emphasizes, adding that the consumption time is 180 days.

A few days ago the portal TasteAtlas, a kind of world encyclopedia of flavors, has placed encebollado as the second best fish soup in the world. This site, created by the publishing group AtlasMedia, has published a new one ranking of the ten best-rated fish soups in the world.

Encebollado received a score of 4.5 points and was behind Finnish salmon soup with 4.6 points.

In a review by TasteAtlas recalls the origin of this dish: “The soup originates from the coast of Ecuador from the time when fishermen were at sea and made soup out of necessity. Since they had some spices and fresh fish, encebollado was created and was widely consumed throughout the country.

But there are other ways of consumption, such as the canned presentation of Negocios Industriales Real Nirsa SA through its Real brand.

A can of real tuna is becoming the new icon of Guayaquil

According to Andrea Paladines, head of marketing at Nirsa, the idea of ​​selling canned encebollad dates back to 2006. “Many years ago, in 2006, we wanted to make an innovation using our raw material Tuna. One day while we were talking, we realized that we always go to eat encebollado with friends and family, then it dawned on us that we could deliver a traditional product from Ecuadorian tables that is of excellent quality and practical at a good price, and so in 2006 we launched the first Real Encebollado in cans together with a communication campaign, winning the hearts of Ecuadorians,” says Paladines.

This encebollado was not only accepted for national consumption, but also came to Ecuadorian tables in other countries. “We currently have our Real Onion product in other parts of the world, such as United States, Peruamong others,” notes Paladines.

The canned product has a maximum shelf life of four years and is in third place in terms of demand, after traditional tuna and sardines. Only 400,000 pieces of onion are sold annually.

“Soon we will have surprises with Encebollado Real, our goal is to continue winning new homes and expand to other international markets,” says Paladines.